Improvement in softening sheep and other skins



aber sata ,sind ditta.

JAMES M. BROWN, OFLYNN, MASSACHUSETTS.

Q Letters Patent No. 109,379, dated November 22,1870.

IMPROVEMENT IN SOFTENING SHEEP AND OTHER SKINS.

The Schedule referred to in these Letters Patent and makingpart of thesame.

as follows In carrying out my invention, I make use of a rotaryl beater and a beam or support for the skin, such rotary beater being composed of one or more dull. blades xcd to a rotary shaft, by means of two or more arms or heads. r

The drawing, herewith presented, represents thc machine as employed by me for theI aforesaid purpose- Figure l being a top view, and A y Figure 2, a vertical section of such machine.

In such drawing- A denotes the frame for supporting the operative parts.

B is the rotary beater, consisting ofl a series of blades, a ,ixeil to the peripheries of two heads, b b, arranged upon and concentric with a` shafto, or having journals projecting from them at their centers.

This rotary beater has its journals supported in boxes, d d, upheld by the frame A..

In rear of this rotary beater is a beam or platform, C, for supporting the skin, suoli beam or platform being, at its lower corners, pivoted to posts ofthe frame A, and provided with screws, ce, for adjusting it relatively to the beater; that is, for moving it nearer to or further from it, as occasion may require, and for holding it in position. The screws screw through one of the girts or cross-bars of the frame A. Y 0u the shaft of the beater is a wheel,f, for putting such beater in revolution -by a belt from a driving pulley or drum.y l

In operating with the machine, the skin, after having been soaked in water, is to be laid, hair-side down, on the top of the vibratory platform or beam G, and extended down between such and the rotary beater, and while the latter may be in rapid revolution, the skin is to bc'moved either upward or downward, on

' both, as occasion may require, uponV the beam, so as to allow the, blade or blades of the beater to come into Contact with the flesh part of the skin, and thoroughly beat thc whole or nearly the whole of such, thereby removing from it the fatty and eshy pox'- tions, or extraneous matters.

j The hide or skin, by this process, will be rapidly softened, cleaned and stretched, and the slimy, glossy, and other animal matters lprone to 'putrefaction will be scraped, from it.

I have found, by the use of a machine of the kind,

and in the manner described, five hundred sheep-skins may be beamed in ten hours by two men, whereas, by the common processiin use, riz., by the ordinary beam and eshiug-knife, they could not beam more than one-thirdjthe number of skins in the same time.

I am aware, that for barring wool upon the skin or removing burrsffrom it, a machine analogous to that bereinbeforc described has been in use, and therefore shall not herein claim such, it never, to my knowledge, having been used for effecting what is termed the Heshiug of skins, o1', more properly the deileshing of them. r

In using it for this latter purpose, it will be perceived that the hair or wool ofthe skin is to be placed directly against the beam or platform, and under this condition constitutes a natural cushion for supporting the skin against the action of the rotary knives or blades while acting against the flesh side of it, such causing the skin to so yield tothe blades as to enable them to evenly dress its surface.

The new mode, hereiubcfore described, of beaming or deileshing and softening a skin, such being, by supporting and moving it on a vibratory beam or platform, andsubjecting it in manner described to the aetion of a rotary beater, made in4 manner and arranged and operating with such beam or platform, substantially as setforth. JAMES M. BROWN. Witnesses:

R. H. EDDY, S. N. Pirna. 

